OnePlus 5T may have violated a patent with its face unlock feature

OnePlus used their home-grown version of face unlock on the OnePlus 5T this year, giving users a quick and mostly secure way to unlock their devices. And honestly, the feature worked pretty well compared to some previous Android devices that utilized face unlock.

However, one of the potential reasons for the OnePlus 5T’s successful feature may be that they infringed on another company’s patent. Whoops.

The CEO of SensibleVision, a biometric security company, has claimed that OnePlus may in violation of one of their patents with their facial recognition unlock feature. In fact, one that seems most likely is SensibleVision’s face illumination patent, although it could be multiple patents according to CEO George Brostoff.

With that being said, that one just seems to be the most likely according to Brostoff, but he wasn’t willing to talk much more about it since they’ve handed the issue off to their legal team.

If OnePlus does see legal trouble from this, things are bound to get messy. OnePlus is based in China while SensibleVision is in the US. That wouldn’t be good news for the OnePlus 5T in the US, but SensibleVision may struggle to find any ground to stop OnePlus in other countries due to how patent laws work around the world.

Born in southern Alabama, Jared spends his working time selling phones and his spare time writing about them. The Android enthusiasm started with the original Motorola Droid, but the tech enthusiasm currently covers just about everything. He likes PC gaming, Lenovo's Moto Z line, and a good productivity app.